Missing Piece in Substance Abuse Treatment - the Brain?

Over the last few months of sitting in many, many hospital rooms, I had the chance to dive deeper into a topic that has always been on my mind - why do people who have brain imbalances & injuries also seem to struggle with substance abuse?  I anecdotally found a connection, but had never followed the stats to see if there is an actual correlation. 

Turns out, there is. A highly identifiable one.  Nearly 66% of people who have some type of brain imbalance, be it post concussion, repetitive subconcussions, or large amounts of brain stress from lifestyles (hello touring life?!) also have co-occurring substance abuse. 

What is usually missed though, is that when these clients would go to rehab, relapse was likely.  Why? The client desperately wanted to be sober, but what was the deal?

My philosophy - the brain imbalance or injury wasn’t rehabbed. 

When a brain is injured, a “sensory mismatch” happens. Meaning, different areas of your brain send different pieces of information around, and your brain can’t match all of that up to create a unified movement, thought, or process. Your brain then learns to find a “known” state in the substance, which makes you seek it out.  If you take the substance away, you’re back to mismatched info floating around.  The problem also becomes that the substance increases this mismatch, creating a perpetual self-destructive cycle.  Studies are beginning to back this up - if you have had a brain injury and have current substance abuse struggles, BOTH the brain injury or imbalance and the substance abuse must be rehabbed, preferably, together. However, finding a facility that offers both can be challenging, so often times, it’s broken up into different treatments.

Is RESTAGE the answer for this problem? Not by ourselves in any means, but if substance abuse rehab is failing on its own, and you’ve had a concussion in the past, or have never been screened for a past brain injury or current brain imbalance, perhaps a piece to your puzzle lies there. 

We’ll help you get started.